different between purgatorial vs purgatory

English

Adjective

purgatorial (comparative more purgatorial, superlative most purgatorial)

1. Of, pertaining to, or resembling purgatory.
   • 1581, James Bell (translator), Against Ierome Osorius Byshopp of Siluane in Portingall by Walter Haddon et al., London: John Daye, Book 3,^[1]

     What aunswere then will you make to him that shall frame out of Saynt Paul an argument to ouerthrow the whole force and estimacion of your Purgatory on this wise?

     Fe. Christ needeth no Purgatoriall Expiation.

     Ri, Christ is our Righteousnes, out of S. Paul.

     So. Ergo. Our Righteousnes needeth not any Purgatoriall Expiation.

   • 1784, John Brown, A Compendious History of the British Churches in England, Scotland, Ireland, and America, Glasgow, Volume 1, p. 113,^[2]

     At the same time, [the three bishops] emitted a summary confession of their faith […] that there is no purgatorial state after this life […]

   • 1848, Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Chapter 35,^[3]

     […] can you suppose it would offend that benevolent Being […] to raise a devoted heart from purgatorial torments to a state of heavenly bliss, when you could do it without the slightest injury to yourself or any other?

   • 1917, James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, London: The Egoist, Chapter 4, p. 171,^[4]

     […] fearful lest in the midst of the purgatorial fire, which differed from the infernal only in that it was not everlasting, his penance might avail no more than a drop of moisture […]

2. That purifies by removing sin; expiatory.
   • 1895, Thomas Hardy, Jude the Obscure, Part 3, Chapter 1,^[5]

     But to enter the Church in such an unscholarly way that he could not in any probability rise to a higher grade through all his career than that of the humble curate wearing his life out in an obscure village or city slum—that might have a touch of goodness and greatness in it; that might be true religion, and a purgatorial course worthy of being followed by a remorseful man.

   • 1970, Ng?g? wa Thiong'o, “George Lamming and the Colonial Situation” in Homecoming: Essays on African and Caribbean Literature, Culture and Politics, London: Heinemann, p. 127,^[6]

     Often […] exile is conceived as a purgatorial experience which the West Indian must undergo in order to know himself.

English

Etymology

From Latin purg?t?rium (“cleansing”). Cognate to English purge.

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /?p????t??i/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?p????t?i/
• US: pur?ga?to?ry
• UK: pur?ga?tory

Noun

purgatory (countable and uncountable, plural purgatories)

1. (Christianity) Alternative letter-case form of Purgatory
2. Any situation where suffering is endured, particularly as part of a process of redemption.
   • 1605, Nicholas Breton, An Olde Mans Lesson, and a Young Mans Loue, London: Edward White,^[1]

     […] many Gods breedeth heathens miseries, many countries trauailers humors, many wiues mens purgatories, and many friends trustes ruine:

   • 1774, John Burgoyne, The Maid of the Oaks, London: T. Becket, Act I, Scene 1, p. 6,^[2]

     I laid my rank and fortune at the fair one’s feet, and would have married instantly; but that Oldworth opposed my precipitancy, and insisted upon a probation of six months absence—It has been a purgatory!

   • 1853, Elizabeth Gaskell, Ruth, Chapter 25,^[3]

     It might be […] that Ruth had worked her way through the deep purgatory of repentance up to something like purity again; God only knew!

   • 1904, Upton Sinclair, The Jungle, Chapter 10,^[4]

     Later came midsummer, with the stifling heat, when the dingy killing beds of Durham’s became a very purgatory; one time, in a single day, three men fell dead from sunstroke.

   • 1997, J. M. Coetzee, Boyhood: Scenes from Provincial Life, Penguin, Chapter 11, p. 100,^[5]

     […] that would mean he would be irrecoverably Afrikaans and would have to spend years in the purgatory of an Afrikaans boarding-school, as all farm-children do, before he would be allowed to come back to the farm.

Related terms

Translations

Adjective

purgatory (comparative more purgatory, superlative most purgatory)

1. Tending to cleanse; expiatory.
   • 1600, Philemon Holland (translator), The Roman Historie Written by T. Livius of Padua, London, Book 41, p. 1103,^[6]

     Last of all, the prodigie of Siracusa was expiat by a purgatory sacrifice, by direction from the soothsaiers to what gods, supplications and sacrifice should be made.

   • 1790, Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France, London: J. Dodsley, p. 272,^[7]

     This purgatory interval is not unfavourable to a faithless representative, who may be as good a canvasser as he was a bad governor.

See also

• heaven
• hell
• limbo
• gehenna